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Free Host

Nowadays many host companies provide free host package for people to try their service. That includes web hosting, file storage and picture hosting, etc. It is good for us if we knows how to make full use of these service. For example, I used to temporary store some files on those free hosting service, such that as long as I am online, I can easily access my documents without being afraid losing my thumb drive or hard disk. And, I also start designing my own website from using free web host service. I think I made full use of these free services, and I would like to share my experience with everyone.

What is free host?

Email Host: I would say the most common free host is free Email accounts such as Gmail, hotmail and yahoo mail. Almost everybody on the internet are using these free services and very few people realized that. Normally I use email to store some of the files are attachments. And then when I change locations or switch computers, I would still be able to access these documents.

File Host: It is not so convenient to store a lot of files as email attachments, as they will mess up. Then we have file storage. Google documents is kind of file storage, but you can only store them in certain format. Then comes some other online storage or online back service. The one I commonly used is Dropbox. It is a website that could allow you to store your file online just like store on your external hard disk. The free account allows you to have 2GB storage space. The space for free account could be up to 18GB when you introduce your friends to use Dropbox. Of course you can always get more if you pay for the service. The beauty of Dropbox is that you can install Dropbox software on your computer and just manage the space as your local drive as long as you are connected to internet. There is plenty of similar service provider. For me, I started with Dropbox, and still stick to Dropbox.

Website Hosting: If you are starting your own website for the first time, I would suggest to start from free web hosting. As you just started, you just need to practice and get familiar with how to set up your website. For most of the time, free web hosting and paid hosting offer the same security, network bandwidth and port speed. The only difference could be the hosting feature included, such as disk storage space, data transfer, more script support, more email account, free domain name, etc. Free hosting service will be sufficient to provide all those you need to practice set up your website. Unless you need specific features offered by those paid hosting plans, or get rid of some feature you don’t like from free host, make full use of those free website hosting service to save you money. Those common free web hosting service provider such as 000webhost, host1free and etc, are also quite worth to try. Anyway, it doesn’t cost you anything.

Why they are free

The is no free lunch in the world. Those company won’t be able to survive if they only offer free service. They also need to make profit to be alive in the market. Perhaps you have noticed that Gmail, Hotmail or Yahoo mail all have advertisement when you log into your inbox. They make profit from those company who pay to advertise. For file storage like Dropbox, they make money from those upgraded account. Similar for website hosting, those service providers also have paid service. They let you try their service by free account, and late on, when you need more features and switch to paid service, they start to make profit.

Thus, just make full use of these free service when they could still provide the service you need. And you could switch to paid plans whenever you what. For website hosting, it is highly recommended that to try their free service if you are a beginner in setting up a website, or if you want to try their service first before make any purchase. If you want to look at those paid web host providers, please look at my other articles regarding the paid web host.